


Wolf Comes Home

by Theoroark



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Abuser Death Coping, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Domestic, F/F, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Panic Attacks, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sexual assault/abuse not explicitly discussed but this was written with that in mind, Team Talon (Overwatch)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-24
Updated: 2018-07-23
Packaged: 2019-04-27 10:34:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14423553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Theoroark/pseuds/Theoroark
Summary: Moira dies. Widowmaker's life goes on.





	1. There's Gonna Be a Party

Gerard, she killed with a knife. She didn’t remember much about him, but she remembered how difficult it had been to hold him down. Mondatta, Amari, all her high profile kills, she had done with the Widow’s Kiss– the product of all her skill and training.

 

Moira took no such effort. Widow simply chose not to intervene as some nameless Shimada goon shot her in the head. Widow watched Moira collapse, watched the Shimadas disperse. She pressed the comms button in her earpiece.

 

“O’Deorain has been killed,” she said. “No hope for resuscitation. Requesting extraction.”

 

She stared at Moira’s body as the pilot chattered frantically in her ear. The kill required no effort, but she still felt alive.

 

-

 

She debriefed with Akande. He pulled her chair out for her, then sat on the other side of his desk and folded his hands. They were both quiet for a moment.

 

“She was shot,” he said.

 

“Yes,” Widow said.

 

“Why were you not able to take out her attacker?”

 

“Someone was approaching my position,” Widow said evenly. “I was keeping an eye on them. I assumed Moira could fend for herself, for the moment.”

 

“As did I.” Akande pinched the bridge of his nose. “This makes things more difficult.”

 

“How, sir?” Widow asked, before she could stop herself. “The Oasis connection was useful, yes, but Korpal is in position to hold office there within the year. Most of O’Deorain’s research was cribbed, and so Sombra is essentially as effective a scientist as she was. It’s unfortunate, but it doesn’t need to drastically alter our plans.”

 

“I know you weren’t always fond of her,” Akande said slowly. “And I disagreed with her treatment of your conditioning, as you know–” Widow nodded, “–and she could be personally… unpalatable.” He rubbed at his neural implants absently. “But she was a very useful asset,” he said. “And this will change things.”

 

Widow did not think Akande knew all that Moira had done. He took pride in the chaos and death he caused, but no unseemly pleasure. He was a very sophisticated kind of cruel, and Widow identified with that.

 

But he had commissioned a Widowmaker. And Moira had done what she had done.

 

“You say conflict makes humanity evolve, right?” she said, and she heard the venom in her voice but could not stop it. “Moira faced conflict. Moira didn’t survive. Moira wasn’t fit for whatever new world we’re making.”

 

Akande stared at her, blinking, and Widow swallowed her unseemly pleasure. She stood. “Do you need anything else?” she asked stiffly.

 

Akande shook his head. “Dismissed.” Widow turned and left his big dark office, and exhaled when the door shut behind her.

 

-

 

She went to find Reyes next. They had sat together in Moira’s lab so many times, and sat together silently afterwards, as Widow drank and Reyes peeled the decaying skin off from around his cuticles. She knocked on his door and there was no answer. She tried the knob and found it unlocked. When she entered, he was hunched over himself on the floor. He was making the little gaspy noises she knew came when his body tried to cry, despite its absence of tears.

 

She crouched next to him. “You’re crying for her?” she asked, and he laughed.

 

“No,” he said. He uncurled a bit and look at Widow with his red eyes. “For me. She was looking into a cure, Widow. She was my only hope.”

 

Widow was silent for a moment, and listened to his breathing as it slowed. “There’s still Ziegler,” she said finally. “She could help you.” Immediately, Reyes snapped his head up, face twisted in anger.

 

“She did this to me,” he said. “She made me this. I’m not going to go crawling back begging to her. Like a dog.”

 

He shuddered and his not-cries renewed. Some of his body came off in little wisps of vapor. Widow set her hand on his back.

 

“She’s gone,” she said. “And you’re still here. You’ve survived, when she didn’t. Things are different now.”

 

He quieted again. She rubbed a small, slow circle on his back.

 

“I just wish I knew what was coming,” he whispered. “I hated her, I did, I’m not stupid. You didn’t have to tell me what she did, I hated her, Widow, I would have made her pay–”

 

“I know,” Widow murmured.

 

“–but I knew her. I knew what she was capable of. I could plot things around her, around what she was telling me, what I thought she wasn’t telling me. Now I don’t know anything.”

 

“I know you’re still here,” Widow said. “And I know I’m still here.” Reyes sighed and leaned against her shoulder. They sat there in his dark apartment and Widow fell asleep against the wall.

 

-

 

When she woke, Reyes was gone. She left his quarters and went to Sombra’s.

 

Sombra was sitting at her kitchen table, flipping through her holovid, backlit by the early morning sun. She looked up quickly when Widow entered. “Good,” she said. “You’re here.” She pushed up from her seat as Widow stood blankly in the middle of the room. “I wanted to see you, as soon as possible, but I wasn’t sure what was going on and I didn’t want to pressure you or anything–”

 

“Sombra.” Widow placed a hand on her waist and Sombra fell silent. “I’m here.”

 

“Yeah,” Sombra said, in one long breath. She tucked a piece of hair behind Widow’s ear. “How do you feel?” she asked.

 

Widow opened her mouth, then shut it. Sombra’s eyes widened. “I– I’m sorry,” she said. She tried to jerk back a little, but Widow held her in place. “I mean, me, I used to like, daydream about killing her, Widow.” She laughed. “I’d come up with all these scenarios, these _Saw_ rooms and these big speeches and all these ways I’d make her pay. And like, that’s just me. She was shitty to me, but–” Sombra cut herself off and shook her head. “But hearing that she died, it still was just– weird. I thought it’d be more. I thought there’d be fireworks and a munchkin number or something. I don’t know.” She looked up at Widow carefully. “I can’t imagine how you feel.”

 

“I can’t either,” Widow said, and when Sombra frowned she elaborated. “I don’t know what I want. I don’t want to be sad she died, of course, but I kind of don’t want to be happy about it either. I just… don’t want to think about her or feel about her or anything about her.” Sombra nodded quietly and Widow continued. “Somehow, I always thought that if she disappeared, everything would get better. I would be fixed. Reyes would be fixed. All the pain she caused would just… evaporate.” Widow tilted her head down and laughed. “And I knew it was silly, I knew it was wrong, of course. But I expected things to be some kind of different. And they are, but just… a different different.”

 

“Okay,” Sombra said.

 

“You don’t understand.”

 

“I don’t think so, no.” Sombra took her hand and swung it gently. “But I’ll try. I will. And I’ll help.”

 

“Okay,” Widow breathed. She shut her eyes and tilted her head down and rested her forehead on Sombra’s.

 

“I’m glad she’s dead, though,” Widow murmured.

 

“So I am.”

 

“I killed her.” Widow opened her eyes slightly to gauge Sombra’s reaction. Sombra was smiling.

 

“I’m glad,” she said, and Widow smiled too. They stood there together in a different world and she and Sombra were different too now, Widow found, but the kind she had never known to hope for.


	2. Take You People Years

Moira had told her she would need to come back to the lab every week, to receive treatment to prevent gangrene from setting in. And yet within a week of Moira’s death and gaining full access to her research, Sombra had developed a way for Widowmaker to remotely treat herself. Akande had expressed vague indignation and annoyance at the time and resources wasted as Sombra politely smiled, and Widow and Reyes said nothing.

 

And so Widow’s leash to Talon was severed. Her quarters at the Talon base felt completely gratuitous. Save for their other frequent occupant.

 

“I’m moving out,” she told Sombra in bed one night. “You should move in with me.”

 

Sombra closed the projected monitor she had been tapping at, bent down and kissed Widow’s forehead, and said, “Okay.” Then she had laid down and wrapped herself around Widow, even though whenever Widow initiated that, she would just complain about her frigid feet and hands. Widow did not call her on it, just lay there and felt Sombra’s breath on her neck.

 

That morning, she told Akande. He had leaned back in his chair and folded his hands.

 

“So Sombra’s leaving too,” he said. Widow nodded. “I believe organizational communication was greatly helped by both of you being on site. I hope you won’t let this affect that.”

 

“We won’t,” Widow said. She studied him. His expression was neutral but she did not think she was imagining the trace of disappointment in his voice. “Sombra is always connected to Talon comm networks– literally, connected. And I believe living in the Chateau will improve our morale, and therefore our output.”

 

“If the quality of your accommodations was the issue, I’m sure we could make renovations.”

 

“I appreciate that, but I don’t think it’d be the same.”

 

For a moment, Akande’s mask fell, and he frowned in earnest. But before Widow could say anything, the mask was back up, and he was typing something into his computer. “Fine. You both have a week’s leave to get settled, but will be on call for emergency missions. I’ll check in with you after that time.” Widow waited and when he added nothing else, she nodded, stood, and left his office.

 

The first day of their leave, Sombra flew to Dorado to gather her things, and Widow set about getting the house ready for her arrival. Every small fault in the house suddenly seemed intolerable. She bought paint to redo the chipping walls in the hallway, ordered new furniture to replace the rickety and old, filled the previously empty refrigerator to the brim. She shot a mouse that she spotted scurrying through the cellar, and then called a contractor to fix the resulting hole in the floor. She cleared out space in her closet and shelves for all of Sombra’s things.

 

The next day, Sombra showed up on her doorstep with a single suitcase. Widow stared at her.

 

“That’s all?” she asked. Sombra shrugged.

 

“Well, I mean, I’ve always moved around a lot, so I travel pretty light. Most of what I need is in my hardwear.” Widow looked between the suitcase and her girlfriend.

 

“This won’t do,” she said.

 

Sombra insisted she did not care, but Widow insisted harder, and so Sombra was pouring over design magazines when the doorbell rang. When Widow opened it, Reyes was standing there, holding a potted cactus.

 

“Hello. I got you two something.” Reyes thrust the cactus out to her.

 

“It’s a cactus,” she said.

 

“Yes.”

 

“Why?”

 

He looked down at it uncomfortably. “It’s a housewarming gift?”

 

“Oh. Thank you.”

 

“Have either of you ever spoken to a human being before in your lives?” Widow and Reyes both jumped, and Sombra elbowed past Widow and took the cactus. “Thanks, Gabe. Smart move, getting something even Ms. One-Shot can’t kill.”

 

“Don’t be so sure,” Widow said. Sombra’s laughter trailed behind her as she carried it to the kitchen. Widow turned back to Reyes.

 

“We’ll be getting some deliveries soon,” she said. “Do you want to stay and help?”

 

Reyes cracked a smile. “Is that a question or a command?”

 

“Come,” Widow said, stepping aside to let him in. “The bookcases should be here any minute.”

 

At some point in the bustle of boxes and Sombra’s chatter, Widow lost track of Reyes. She went looking for him, and found him on the balcony of the bedroom he’d taken Sombra’s suitcase to.

 

“Hey,” he said when she walked up next to him. “Sorry. Just needed some fresh air.”

 

“It’s fine,” she said. She leaned up against the railing next to him. They were both silent for a bit.

 

“Will you be okay, when I’m gone?” she asked. She legitimately cared about his response, which felt bizarre, but he nodded vigorously and that relieved her.

 

“I have Akande, and you two won’t be far. And Sombra’s always on her holovid anyway.” Reyes slowly drummed his fingers on the railing, staring out over the lake. “I won’t be lonely and I certainly won’t be bored. I’m not sad you’re going. It’s just… still strange. Everything’s changing so much.”

 

“I know,” Widow said. She could distantly hear the sound of another delivery truck pulling up, but neither of them moved. “It’s strange for me too.”

 

“Are you okay?”

 

“What? Yes. This is what I want.” Reyes smiled a little and she smiled back. “The only thing I’m concerned about is business. And even then, just if Akande will be an ass about this move or not.”

 

“Are you upset with him?” Reyes asked. The question should have bothered her, seeing as it was coming from Akande’s boyfriend. But Reyes was also the man who sat next to her in Moira’s waiting room, and she was painfully aware of how powerful that is.

 

“I’m not sure if I should be, is the thing,” she said. “I think if he knew everything Moira had done, he… would not have approved.” Reyes nods, looking down. “But he seemed annoyed that I was moving. And so it worries me, that he wants to keep me in his sight.”

 

“I don’t think that’s it,” Reyes said. “Akande trusts you, more than anyone else at Talon. Myself included.” Widow snorted, but couldn’t argue with that. “He just cares about you, too.”

 

She cocked her head. “So he’s not annoyed I moved?”

 

Reyes opened his mouth, closed it, and sighed. “You two will be fine,” he said. “Maybe just let him know how you’re feeling?”

 

“I don’t feel,” Widow said. “That’s the point, isn’t it?” Reyes shoved her and groaned, and she smiled.

 

Reyes left in the evening, and left them with minimal boxes to unpack. Sombra declared that they had done enough work for the day and that they deserved a drink. Widow refilled her glass as Sombra poached a chicken and chatted happily about the gourmet markets of the area. She served them enchiladas verdes. Widow remembered the strict meal plans Moira had had her follow, and cleaned her plate.

 

In the middle of the night, Widow woke up. Sombra was curled away from her. She lay there and tried to fall back asleep, but her king size bed suddenly felt too small for two people.

 

It wasn’t that Sombra was an inconsiderate bedmate. She had told Sombra she wasn’t interested in sex, and Sombra had understood. “I like you,” she had said. “And I’m not like, perma-horny or whatever. We’re both resourceful. We’ll work something out.” Widow had nodded and did not tell Sombra that Sombra having a sex drive bothered her less than her own lack of one. But they had worked something out, like Sombra had promised. For all that Sombra lied, she always made good on her promises to Widow.

 

She had told Moira she wasn’t interested in sex too. When Sombra had found her she had reached out to touch her shoulder, perhaps foolishly but from some instinctive compassion. Widow had swept her legs. She hurt Sombra, who always listened. She had not laid a hand on Moira.

 

The bed was too small for two people. The room was too small for Widow. She got up as quietly as she could and walked through the hallways until she found her way outside. From the terrace, she could see the wide expanse of the lake, hear the tide lapping softly against the shore. She remembered being told there were monsters in it as a child, and how they had frightened her more than any terrestrial creature. In the water, even the simplest moment of survival was a struggle won, and she could not imagine fighting a monster on top of fighting to keep herself afloat.

 

Her holovid was in her hand, she realized absently. She opened it and after staring at the screen for a moment, called Akande. After a minute of ringing, he answered.

 

“It is well past operating hours, Lacroix,” he said, rubbing his face. “I hope you have a good reason for waking me.”

 

“Are you mad I left?” she asked. Akande dropped his hand.

 

“Why do you ask?” he said, suddenly sounding much more awake.

 

“You clearly didn’t want me to move out,” she said. “And Reyes came to visit us, and you didn’t. I know he told you he was coming. Why didn’t you come too?”

 

“I’m a busy man, Lacroix. I can’t just drop everything for social breaks.”

 

“You wouldn’t have given us leave if there was something important going on,” she snapped. “You weren’t busy. You just didn’t want to come.”

 

The projection of Akande was no longer meeting her eyes. “I’m not upset you left, Lacroix,” he said after a moment.

 

“Okay.”

 

“But you leaving changes things. I am simply… trying to figure out what those changes are.”

 

Widow tapped her fingers on the railing, frowning. “What do you think they are?”

 

“Well. Like I said previously, communication will suffer. Even if Sombra is connected,” he said, cutting off Widow as she opened her mouth to argue. “The official channels will remain active, but when you were on base, we would run into each other in the halls and training rooms, and have conversations then. I remember some excellent strategies coming from our morning runs. That will change.”

 

Widow stared at Akande, uncharacteristically fidgeting. She remembered Reyes’s evasion. She smiled softly.

 

“Akande,” she said. “You think I’m giving up on our sparring matches? Our strategy meetings? Our book club? What would I even do without those?”

 

Akande blinked and looked up at her, and then matched her smile. “That’s good to hear,” he said. “I suppose I wasn’t sure.”

 

“Understandable. But I don’t intend to let our relationship suffer.”

 

Akande laughed quietly. “That’s what Gabriel said.”

 

“Sometimes he knows what he’s talking about.” She heard an indignant noise in the background and frowned. “Is he there?”

 

“You called my boyfriend in the middle of the night,” she heard in the distance. “What did you think?”

 

“I thought you would be–” She sighed. “You don’t sleep. Right.” Akande grinned at her sheepishly.

 

“I’ll call you later?”

 

“Later,” she agreed. “Good night Akande. Reyes.” There was a begrudging grumble, Akande gave her a small wave, and his image disappeared. She went back into the house and lay back down and it felt like she could breath in the room again.

 

If Sombra had noticed her absence, she did not say anything the next day. Widow suspected she did not. Sombra had gone to sleep early that night, or early for her. She had been exhausted from the move and probably would have slept through the house falling down around her. But the next night, Sombra was back on her typical insomniac sleep schedule. Widow lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, as Sombra tapped at her screens, steadfastly refusing to sleep. At base, she had quickly learned to tune it out, but now, the purple light seemed impossibly bright and the nearly inaudible tapping echoed in her ears.

 

It was too much, it was too small, she couldn’t breath. She threw off the covers and got out of bed and headed for the door.

 

“Widow?” Sombra called after her. Widow sped up. But she still heard Sombra’s second call as she descended down the stairs, and it hurt. She walked into the kitchen. Reyes’s stupid cactus was on the table in the breakfast nook. She sat on the bench and stared at it. He could gotten her anything, but he had gotten her another damn thing to look after, that she could fail. She was barely keeping her head above water as it was. She didn’t need any more responsibility. She always hated failure, but here, she realized, failure was intolerable because Moira would have loved it. When the best revenge was living well, unhappiness became a humiliating concession. She wanted to dump the pot out in the lake but Sombra fucking liked the thing, so she couldn’t do that, now could she.

 

“Hey.” Widow jumped in her seat and when she turned, Sombra was holding up her hands. “Hey, I just– are you okay?”

 

Widow stared at her blankly and when Sombra took a step towards her she said, “What if this doesn’t work out?” 

 

“You mean like– we break up?” Sombra asked. Widow nodded. “I mean– I’ve moved before and I can move again. We’re both good at our jobs, once we get past the initial awkwardness we’ll be okay. It’ll be a change, but not the end of the world.”

 

Sombra thought she had asked because she was concerned about her. It was almost adorable. “What’s going to happen to me if this doesn’t work out?”

 

“Well,” Sombra said, with an awful softness. “If we break up, I don’t know if you’ll want me helping you, or if I even could help. But you’ll have Gabe and Doomfist. And you’re tough, Widow. You can get through anything. I know you can.”

 

Widow pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes and shook her head. She wanted so much from Sombra, too much. Sombra lied to everyone else but always told Widow the truth, and that was not enough for her. The night after she came back from Moira’s, Sombra had sat across from her, not touching her, and cried. And Widow had felt a sick satisfaction that someone else knew a fraction of what she felt, and a faint annoyance that Sombra would never know the extent of it. Widow remembered Gerard telling her stories about people like Dr. Ziegler and Jesse McCree, who went through terrible things and became more compassionate people because of it. She did not know what fault lay in her and Reyes, that terrible things just made them more terrible.

 

Sombra was watching her and that same fear from that night was back on her face. “She’s just still here,” Widow said. “She’s dead and she can still ruin this for me. She’ll always be able to do that.” Sombra took another step forward. “I hate it. I hate it, I hate it, I hate it.”

 

“Widow,” Sombra said quietly. “I’m sorry. I wish I had a way to fix this for you. But I don’t. I’m sorry. All I can tell you is that I don’t plan on going anywhere. And I love you.”

 

Widow had grown up surrounded by stories of grand and instinctive love and she had lost that along with half her heart rate. But she remembered telling Sombra, not long after that night, that she wanted to love her. And Sombra had said, “then do it,” not judgmental, not demanding, just like it was as simple a choice as picking what shoes to wear. And so Widow chose to love Sombra, for however much that was worth. She stood and closed the distance between them and hugged her. Sombra buried her face in her shoulder and Widow closed her eyes.

 

“I’m not going anywhere either,” Widow said. Sombra teared up against her cold skin and Widow pulled back, and led her back to bed.

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry for the Mountain Goats title but this was a very Sunset Tree fic. Written after I saw a nasty ass Moicy comic because this is how I handle things now apparently.
> 
> I'm @tacticalgrandma if you want to talk to me there.
> 
> Thank you so much for reading, and any comments/kudos would mean the world to me <3


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